Identity
by StarJade
Summary: He was a contract killer, with a damaged past and no future. She was unknowingly the daughter of one of his victims. Strung together by fate, secrets unfold as pasts unveil themselves and love creeps up on the most unlikely of individuals.


Card Captor Sakura

Identity

**Chapter 1**

_-starjade_

Chapter 1

Smoke entangled itself around his tongue and he slowly breathed it out, watching it puff out in amusing circles. Flipping the lighter on and off, he looked to his side, waiting as patiently as he could for a sign of movement inside the room.

Nothing yet. He continued to take drags out of his cigarette, closing his eyes but keeping the rest of his senses alert.

Absolutely nothing. No movement. It was as if no one was inside the room.

He knew something was up then, so he pushed off the wall he was leaning against and dropped the cigarette on the richly carpeted floor. Grounding it with his toe, he rubbed his jaw and stuffed the lighter back into his pocket. Just as he was about to turn to the door, he heard laughter.

Coming from the elevators.  
Quickly, he made it seem as if he was entering another room and watched an old man laughingly pull a girl who looked like jail bait behind him.

" This is the grand room!" He announced, leering at the girl suggestively. " Are you sure you can handle it?"

The girl let out a peal of giggles and the white haired man roared with laughter as if her supposed 'shy' reaction was unexpected.

" Well, then! Let's see if your words match up with your actions," The man growled, and the door clicked shut.

The man let go of the doorknob he had been jiggling with and slammed a hand on the wall. That bastard, he thought to himself. The boss had given him the wrong lead. Said that the old geezer would be in the room, alone when the job was to be done.

So much for that idea.

A housekeeper bustled by just as he was about to light another cigarette. She clucked disapprovingly, watching him as if he was supposed to put the cigarette away. Instead, he lit the end and took a long puff, raising his eyebrows at the housekeeper questioningly. Se put her head down and wheeled her cart away and he looked after her, a quirk of a smile coming to his face.

Then he took out his gun and kicked down the door with so much force that the entire floor jerked. He heard the housekeeper shriek, since she hadn't quite gotten out of sight when he decided to destroy the door.

Storming into the room, he found the man about to do the dirty deed with the blond bimbo. The blond screamed, seeing him with the handgun but before the geezer could turn around, he had popped a bullet into the side of his snowy hair covered head.

Screaming followed him as he threw the geezer back on the bed, the blood quickly soaking up onto the bed sheets and stoically walked out the doors.  
He went down the stairs and threw his shades on as soon as he got to the bottom floor. Nodding to the desk clerk, he walked out of the hotel, his gun secured in the back of his jeans and the cigarette hanging from his lips.

Syaoran Li. Contract killer.

He had a job to do and his job was to get rid of people, quickly and painlessly. It was always the low down criminals, the ones who had done heinous crimes and somehow got away with it.

He took them down...for a price.

--------

" Oh for god's sake," Harley admonished, staring down at the auburn haired girl with more than enough distaste. " Will you get your nose out of that book and help out for once?"

" Just one more minute," A voice came from somewhere inside that book and Harley let out a snort. Quickly, with the reflexes of someone who had done this a million times before, Harley snapped the book out of Sakura's hands and held it behind her book as Sakura reached for it pathetically.

" Harley!" Sakura whined, her eyes glaring at the woman with as much furiousness as she could muster. " I was reading that!"

" And the household chores? What about those, dear?" Harley said, her voice dripping with fake sweetness.

Sakura looked around the small, messy room and sighed. " Yeah, yeah, I know. I'll get to it. But you better give me my book back after this," Sakura warned and Harley laughed as she left the room, dusting off a dirtied lamp as she went.

Sakura let out a breath, viewing the room beneath her long bangs and leaned back against the windows that she had been sitting beside before Harley had rudely interrupted her. Unwillingly, she started to pick up the clothes and dirt around the floor.

Sakura's 'quaint' family lived in a small apartment near the heart of Japan. They never had to worry about money because her father produced enough of it when it was required, even though he never worked. Sakura wanted to ask, many times, but her father's tired face and Harley's warning glares always stopped her. She had long since decided to let it be and live life as it came.

They lived in one of the poorer regions of Japan, for a reason Sakura never knew. They used to be filthy rich, when Sakura had been around seven years old. They lived in a mansion in one of the upper levels of Japan, and Harley had been her nurse. Those memories were faint in Sakura's mind and she hardly thought about it after the ten years she had spent in this apartment.

" Sakura? Are you getting those clothes picked up or not?"

" I AM! FOR _GOD _SAKES!" Sakura screeched, annoyed out of her mind. She could feel Harley's amusement at finally riling her up and Sakura began to slam the clothes into the hamper beside her bed haphazardly.

I'm almost eighteen and I'm still being treated like, like some child, Sakura thought tiredly. Sakura worked as well, in a coffee shop just down the street. She almost lived there because as much as her father provided for the family, he was never around enough to know about the expenses required for a growing girl.

Like her everyday frappacino requirement.

That _couldn't _be ignored.

As soon as Sakura's clothes were picked up and her room was nearly spotless, Sakura quickly changed into her stained work uniform and bustled down the stairs.

" Harley, work! Be back at nine," Sakura called out.

" Sakura!" Harley came rushing out of the kitchen, flour peppered all over her shirt and face. " Your father's coming today for dinner! Are you sure you want to be out at work?"

Sakura stared at Harley, rather surprised. Her father was hardly home and when he was, he hardly paid any attention to her. He might rustle her hair before she left, and tell her she had grown a lot, often thinking her a lot younger than her real age. Just a few weeks ago, the last visit they had gotten from her father, he had thought she was twelve.

Tugging on her short hair, she absentmindedly wondered if she indeed looked like a young child. Resolving to grow out her hair, Sakura shrugged.

" I don't care if he comes home this time. Harley. Tell him I'm at work," Sakura said quietly. Harley just looked at her, pityingly before Sakura walked out the door and down the street towards her work and her haven.

Harley was like a mother to her, but it never could make up for the fact that Harley _wasn't _her mother. She had no idea who, what, where her mother was. Most of the time, Sakura did not want to find out.

As soon as she had reached " KoolKoffee" the quaint little coffee shop Sakura worked at, she felt herself breathe, oxygen running into her lungs like precious water.

Her father stressed her out.

And this was the first time Sakura was purposely not going to be all over her father on one of his visits. Not sit there, hoping he would notice her. Ask her how her day went. How all her days went. Her marks, her friends, her crushes...anything, at all. She would rush around like a crazy woman, cooking him all his favourite foods and reminding him of funny past memories...but he would sit on the couch., his eyes glued to the news station on TV, paying her no mind.

As if she was invisible.

And Sakura was sick of it.

" Hey, Doll!" Jaren walked towards her, wrapping her in a quick hug. Grabbing her visor from her hands, he slung it over her head and grinned at her, a wide toothed grin that always brightened her day. " KoolKoffee's best employee is here!"

" Dolly!" Kimmy screeched, her pink hair already sticking straight up as it does whenever the shop was busy. " Would you stop flirting with Jaren and get your ass to the counter? We need some help out here!"

Sakura rolled her eyes at Jaren and he giggled as he chucked her under the chin. " Yeah, Doll. Stop flirtin around with me now, and get those espressos to those lazy jerks out there."

Sakura smiled and got the visor back in a comfortable position on her head as she headed out to the counter. She wiggled her butt a little and looked back at Jaren. " Coming?" She asked, fluttering her eyelashes.  
Jaren let out a roar of laughter and followed Sakura back behind the counter. " Of course."

Sakura grinned wide and turned to her first customer of the day, quickly getting into the work happily an comfortably. This wasn't a job that Sakura wanted to do for the rest of her life, but it was something that got her mind off of her family and got her away from the depressing apartment. She had friends here, she connected with people here.

Even if none of them knew who she really was.

" Dolly!" Kimmie hurried around her and looked at her pleadingly. " You mind getting a refill on the flavour shots for the cappuccinos? My hands are full here!"

Sakura nodded and ran to the back, picking up the flavour shots as quickly as possible. As she turned, she re-adjusted her name tag that flashed the happy name " Dolly" in those bright, pink words that clashed horribly with her dark green uniform.

She was Dolly. The best employee of KoolKoffee.

And she was going to find out why she had to hide her identity from the rest of the world. Why she couldn't be Sakura. Where her father was on those long trips. And when she did, she would finally walk the earth as Sakura Kinomoto, the adult with the mission to make something of her life independently rather than always in her father's choking grasp.

" Welcome to KoolKofee, how may I take your order?" Sakura asked her customer and grinned widely.

_One step at a time. _

a/n: IM BAAAAAAAAACKKk

missed me?


End file.
